Another week, another story lifted straight from the US sitcom. This time, a Broken Hill man has been convicted for trying to get a refund on thousands of beverage containers from NSW under South Australia’s bottle deposit scheme.
The plot mirrors a 1996 episode ‘The Bottle Deposit’ where characters Kramer and Newman scheme to take empty bottles to another state to collect a refund.
The 36-year-old man had shown up at the South Australian collection depot with a whopping 37 bales, four clear plastic bags, one black garbage bag and two chaff bags full of containers seeking a $7,000 refund.
But the depot owner reported him to the Environment Protection Authority (EPA). According to them, the scammer confessed he’d collected the cans from the Wilcannia Pub in NSW, from family and friends and his own stash accumulated from drinking 13 beers a day (why are we not surprised?)
The result? A fine of $4,800 – plus $960 in court costs and to the victims of crime levy. He was also ordered to surrender the 45,000 containers to the EPA.
That said, we think he should have known the scam wouldn’t work – in Seinfeld, they never even make it to the depot, instead dodging bullets from an angry farmer.
Proof crime really doesn’t pay.
